ABSTRACT
The belief that texts can heal and protect against all possible forms of evil was omnipresent during the Middle Ages. Pronouncing the words and touching the object brings about the transmission of healing power and defense against evil to the bearer, the speaker, or the one who is spoken to. In a 2011 essay on physical rituals in devotional books Kathryn Rudy discusses several examples of printed leaflets, pasted into a book. The book and the small leaflet discussed by Rudy offer various extremes in terms of material size for textual amulets. In the early phases of printing, large numbers of leaflets were printed with short prayers and devotional pictures. The short prayer is a salutation of Jesus, who is called the conqueror of death, the giver of grace, and the comforter of the afflicted. Anyone who ends this prayer with a Pater Noster, the rubric continues, will receive four hundred Masses, that is, Masses said for his salvation.
